This article begins and ends with the question of what we should call smartphones and argues that “trackers” would be more accurate. Is that the real rhetorical purpose of the article? Do they really want us to rename our phones? If not, why did they frame the argument in this way? Write your answer in your 1984 notebook.
Postreading
Activity47:Summarizing and Responding
Write a “rhetorical précis” of the article in your 1984 notebook.
Sentence 1: Name of author, genre, and title of work, date in parentheses; a rhetorically accurate verb; and a THAT clause containing the major assertion or thesis statement in the work.
Sentence 2: An explanation of how the author develops and supports the thesis, usually in chronological order.
Sentence 3: A statement of the author’s apparent purpose, followed by an “in order to” phrase.
Sentence 4: A description of the intended audience and/or the relationship the author establishes with the audience.
Activity48:Thinking Critically
Write answers to the questions below in your 1984 notebook.
1. Paragraph 6 discusses the various names that have been suggested for smartphones—tracker, robot, minicomputer—and says,
This is not a semantic game. Names matter, quite a bit. In politics and advertising, framing is regarded as essential because what you call something influences what you think about it. That’s why there are battles over the tags “Obamacare” and “death panels.”
Is it true that the name of something influences the way you think about it? Does it influence the way you use it? What effect do you think changing the name of the device will actually have?
2. Paragraph 8 asks, “What’s the harm?” and then says,
The United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, ruling about the use of tracking devices by the police, noted that GPS data can reveal whether a person “is a weekly church goer, a heavy drinker, a regular at the gym, an unfaithful husband, an outpatient receiving medical treatment, an associate of particular individuals or political groups—and not just one such fact about a person, but all such facts.” Does this quotation answer the question? Does it show that there is actual harm in cellphone tracking? Why or why not?
This article begins and ends with the question of what we should call smartphones and argues that “trackers” would be more accurate. Is that the real rhetorical purpose of the article? Do they really want us to rename our phones? If not, why did they frame the argument in this way? Write your answer in your 1984 notebook.
Postreading
Activity47: Summarizing and Responding
Write a “rhetorical précis” of the article in your 1984 notebook.
Sentence 1: Name of author, genre, and title of work, date in parentheses; a rhetorically accurate verb; and a THAT clause containing the major assertion or thesis statement in the work.
Sentence 2: An explanation of how the author develops and supports the thesis, usually in chronological order.
Sentence 3: A statement of the author’s apparent purpose, followed by an “in order to” phrase.
Sentence 4: A description of the intended audience and/or the relationship the author establishes with the audience.
Activity48: Thinking Critically
Write answers to the questions below in your 1984 notebook.
This is not a semantic game. Names matter, quite a bit. In politics and advertising, framing is regarded as essential because what you call something influences what you think about it. That’s why there are battles over the tags “Obamacare” and “death panels.”
Is it true that the name of something influences the way you think about it? Does it influence the way you use it? What effect do you think changing the name of the device will actually have?
The United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, ruling about the use of tracking devices by the police, noted that GPS data can reveal whether a person “is a weekly church goer, a heavy drinker, a regular at the gym, an unfaithful husband, an outpatient receiving medical treatment, an associate of particular individuals or political groups—and not just one such fact about a person, but all such facts.”
Does this quotation answer the question? Does it show that there is actual harm in cellphone tracking? Why or why not?